Birmingham crept back into the automatic Championship places - but if this is the best they can do, then rivals Sheffield United have no need to worry.

Birmingham crept back into the automatic Championship places - but if this is the best they can do, then rivals Sheffield United have no need to worry.

It was a disappointing performance from the Blues and the best you can say about them is they were average.

Charlton, heading in the opposite direction with relegation inevitable, gave as good as they got.

In fact, a stranger in the ground could have been forgiven for thinking Charlton were the team going for promotion, as they produced their best performance of the season.

The Addicks have now lost only once in five games. But unfortunately for them, the revival has come too late.

They would have won but for a bad miss by Zheng Zhi and a super show from Birmingham goalkeeper Maik Taylor.

Zheng got the chance to break the deadlock in the 74th minute after Taylor made his only mistake. He got in a tangle with defender Radhi Jaidi, missed the ball and left Zheng with a clear shooting chance. But the Chinese midfielder topped his shot allowing Stephen Carr to clear the effort off the line.

Taylor redeemed himself later with a string of saves to earn Blues their precious point.

He pushed a shot from Lloyd Sam against the woodwork and away to safety and also got down quickly to get to an effort from Nicky Bailey.

But he saved the best until last with a fantastic one-handed save from outstanding teenager Jonjo Shelvey, who hit the ball goalwards and saw Taylor react by getting a hand up to knock it away - even though he was wrong-footed.

Bottle

Blues boss Alex McLeish said: "Taylor was superb, absolutely first class. He's been doing that all the time and has had a fantastic season." McLeish believes it will come down to bottle as the race for promotion reaches boiling point, and believes his players have the experience and temperament to deal with it.

"The way Charlton played did not surprise us at all and we knew it would be tough. You have to earn the right to win matches and we did not earn it here.

"The run-in will be tough and character and temperament will play a big part. We must have a strong mentality, believe we can do it and I am sure we have what it takes to handle it.

"It's in our hands. I'm challenging the players to win all our games." Charlton boss Phil Parkinson said: "We have gone toe-to-toe with the top of the league and made them look ordinary.

"I thought they might have had a go at us with a 4-4-2 formation. But they mixed us up with five in midfield and that's a compliment to us.

"Darren Ward had a goal ruled out for offside. But people who have seen a replay of it told me it should have stood.

"That decision cost us the three points, but we can take so much from the game. If I had this team available earlier in the season we would be nowhere near the bottom three." Charlton have every reason to be satisfied with their performance, but if they lose at Coventry tomorrow relegation will be all but confirmed.

And Birmingham will have to improve a lot if they are to clinch automatic promotion back to the Premier League.